Accessibility Links

A Brexit shipwreck suits Nicola Sturgeon’s steady ship

ALEX MASSIE

The SNP leadership is keeping its options open in the knowledge that independence is not an imminent proposition

In Birmingham last week, the Conservative conference offered the slogan “Opportunity”, though, alas, the precise nature of these opportunities remained largely mysterious. This week in Glasgow, the SNP’s slogan is “Hope”. That seems fitting, if only because there is a sense in which this is a Micawberish conference for a party that is waiting — and hoping — for something to turn up. If the Tory conference was something to be endured, this is a conference stuck in a holding pattern.

That something, of course, is the possibility of a second independence referendum. Brexit is understood to be both a calamity and an opportunity. As Mike Russell, Scotland’s Brexit minister, admitted, the problem is that the timing of a referendum “is not in our gift”.…

Want to read more?

Subscribe now and get unlimited digital access on web and our smartphone and tablet apps, free for your first month.